Probably silly question but here it goes

[jlbfish]

When changing the water in a new tank, that is currently cycling with fish do I vacuum the gravel? If so these are little fish and there are 6. Do you guys take your fish out when you vacuum so you don't have to watch out for them?

I have a betta in the other tank we vac but he is easy to look out for. This tank has 6 tetras. I'm afraid I'm gonna suck one up!

Jana

 

[librarygirl]

Yes you want to vacuum to suck up any excess food and waste that can breakdown and contribute to toxin levels. I have small fish too and I don't remove them, just move slowly and keep an eye out, they tend to get out of the way.

 

[janky]

I'm still new to this, so take it fwiw... but I don't remove the fish when I vacuum. Seems excessive and hard... too lazy lol

just keep an eye out. I have a couple tiny ghost shrimp and they're hard to see..so I don't let anything distract me while I do it lol

 

[Lovin Fish]

Like they said keep an eye out. They generally do move out of the way, but once your fish get acustomed to you digging around they will trust you and then they start getting in the way! My glowlights, rummynose and bettas all pester me when I'm trying to vacuum always swirling around the hose and nibbling at my arm. I almost sucked up a glowlight yesterday in fact! Silly little things! They used to zoom out of the way. Those days are long over.

 

[mjrobbins2]

i despise ghost shrimp. i had one and he dug himself into the gravel and basically injured himself because he couldnt get out from under the rocks. dumbbutts

 

[HeatherW]

while you are doing a fish in cycle you don't need to go crazy on the vacuuming part. you do need to clean up some of the mess down there though. I just put my tube in slowly and try and keep it low to the gravel all the time then move slowly so the guys don't get in the way. always looking to see if anyone gets in there. I have little molly fry so they are pretty small. little guys love to come over to the tube when all the food and gunk is going up - they think it is feeding time, but they can't get to it lol fun to watch. but I think they pretty much stay out of the way. I think i read somewhere that they can swim in the tube and still are able to swim out of it, so just keep an eye on them. it is way too hard to remove the fish and not good for them anyways - it is stressful to be netted and they get used to the vacuuming.